More Major Mobile App Upgrades!

A few weeks ago our mobile team released an update to our mobile apps (Android and iOS) to support the creation (and review/approval) of expenses from your smartphone. Today they're excited to announce the next set of improvements: the addition of powerful Activity Streams on all objects in your account and the ability to create and edit tasks!

Activities Everywhere!

One of the best things about Accelo is that you can go to a client, sale or other object in the platform and through the activity stream you're able to see the latest that has been going on. With automatic email and calendar synchronization, Accelo makes it easy to confidently see the latest just before you start talking to a client.

Of course, one of those places you're most likely to want to check in on the latest is just before you go into that client meeting, so not having this super useful information at your fingertips through our mobile apps has been a big gap - until today.

With this new release of our mobile app, Accelo lets you easily see the activity stream almost anywhere:

• Clients & Contacts: See all of the activities - emails, meetings, etc - between you, your colleagues and client contacts from the "Activities" tab on the company or contact view screens. This includes activities logged against any sales, projects or other client work where the activity is to or from a client contact, so from this one view you really can see everything!
• Sales: ideal for the sales and account managers using Accelo, you can now go into any of the sales you're working on and tap on the "Activities" tab and see all of the work going on to try and win that deal. Accelo now also makes it a breeze to send an activity when you're viewing the sale - and better than a regular email, if you send it out via Accelo you'll be able to see when the recipients receive, open and click on any links on the email!

• • Projects: ideal for the project managers wanting to check in - or ask questions of their colleagues - as they work on a project, the "Activities" tab in Accelo includes not just the activities for the top-level project, but also the work done and notes logged against any milestone or task in the project; perfect to be able to see where a project is at, anytime, anywhere.
  • Tickets & Issues: great for those client service folks out on the road, the ability to see all of the notes, emails and other activities against a Ticket or Issue ensures you need never show up on-site with a client in the dark.
  • Retainers: perfect for folks managing the high value ongoing work for clients, the retainers module lets you see Activities at both the top-level for the whole retainer, and also in the time-segments (Periods) of work.
  • Tasks: finally, we've also made it possible to see the activities on your tasks through the mobile app - making it easy to not only see the work you've got on the go, but get all the context you need in the palm of your hand.

Supercharged Tasks

The other major improvements the team have shipped today revolve around Tasks! While the Task Board was the first feature we released in our mobile app, the ability to create tasks and edit the full details of a task hasn't been possible in the mobile app - until today!

Creating Tasks

As we all know, it is often the times your mind is wandering that you remember a task you have to do but need to create so you don't forget about it! Now, whether you're on the bus, waiting for a train or just out of the shower, you'll be able to quickly and easily create the task that comes to mind in your Accelo account.

There's two ways to create tasks in Accelo:

1. For Android, you can click on the "Add" icon anywhere, while in iOS, just tap on the Create icon on the right of the Tasks option in the Modules menu. As part of the creation process you can search for the Company, Sale, Project, Milestone, Ticket or Retainer to put the task against;
2. You can find what you want to put your task against and then click on the "Add" icon and we'll automatically link the new task against that client/sale/project/etc. - Android version only.

When you create a task it will be available instantly in the web application too, and if you assign the task to a colleague they'll get an email notification letting them know about the new task assignment.

Editing Tasks

Our new upgrade to tasks also includes the ability to edit tasks - updating the description, changing due date, assignee, time estimate and more. Prior to this update you were only able to progress the status of a task. This, combined with being able to log time through activities can help make that commute a lot more productive - closing out the tasks you finished that day and logging the hours spent.

More Status Changing on the Way

Of course, being able to "Create" a new task or "Complete" an existing one when you're on-site work with a client is great, but we also know that changing status of many other parts of Accelo - from moving a sale along the funnel, to closing out a ticket as complete - is something many of our users are waiting for.

We hear you, and we've got a bunch of work scheduled around the corner to change how the status progressions rules - which can include some fairly extensive screens that don't translate well to smartphone screen sizes - are able to be handled in a clever way that ensures you have a lot of power when you're on the road without needing to sacrifice consistency and quality in your business processes. Watch this space!